


Heal Around It

by KateHunter



Category: Nothing Much to Do
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-17
Updated: 2015-09-17
Packaged: 2018-04-21 05:07:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4816160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KateHunter/pseuds/KateHunter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John finally musters up the courage to talk to Hero. Post-NMTD</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heal Around It

heal around it  
or  
there’s still glass in my your our palms from that night

She never really forgot. She forgave and she smiled through it all and they all celebrated graduations and Christmases and university moving away days. She threw herself into being her old self again without knowing who that was.  
Nice, quiet, even, safe.

It was almost closing time and Hero just wanted to go home to her bed and listen to the rain. But the university students were still discussing some literature theory and with half full coffee cups in front of them. And the boy was sitting in the corner. Pen scrawling and hot chocolate cooling down. The boy kept coming in, never saying a word to Hero, and somehow in the past eight Fridays she hadn’t taken his order. Maybe he planned it that way. He was always in that same seat looking out over street.  
Knowing the students would be at least another half an hour Hero set about making herself a hot chocolate.

“You’ve never seen The Breakfast Club? My house, right now. Movie night bitches.” Hero looked up in surprise as the four students packed up and left in a hurry of coats and umbrellas.

“Hi.” The boy was standing in front of her. He had brought his mug back.

“He speaks.” Hero pushed the hot chocolate she made had towards him and moved around the counter to gather up the mess the students had left.

“I’ve uh, actually been meaning to do that.”

“For eight weeks in a row?”

“You counted.”

Hero couldn’t think of anything to say back to that. She wished she hadn’t given him the satisfaction of her timekeeping. Hero loaded the dishwasher up and turned it on. Maybe the sound of swishing water would make this whole thing less awkward. By the time she turned to face him again he still hadn’t taken a sip. The counter kept them separated.

“Drink up John, it’s on me.”

“Make one for yourself.”

Hero didn’t want to drink (hot chocolate but still) with John Donaldson but her bones needed warming for whatever was coming. John watched on as she whipped up an identical drink in a minute.

“You wanted to talk? I thought you had said everything you wanted to say at the picnic.”

“My therapist said that I should check in with you. See how you’re doing.”

“See if I hate you.”

“No, not that.” John said calmly, like he had been expecting that question.

“So you’ve been coming in here waiting for a moment to talk to me for eight weeks instead of talking to me at school. Where you see me five days a week.”

“Yes.”

The awkward moment hung between them. The dishwasher sloshed behind them and Hero took a sip of her drink.

“I wanted to see how you are. How you’re coping, how you feel about it all.” John said, voice shaky.

“Because your therapist said you should.” Hero couldn’t keep the disbelief out of her voice.

“No, she’s actually really only been helping me get the nerve up. This was my idea.” Hero’s was surprised at his honesty.

“Why? We’ve talked. It’s done, John. There isn’t anything to talk about.”

“I reached into your life and pushed and pulled pieces of it until it fell apart. I hurt you, Hero!” The shaking voice was gone, replaced with one of conviction.

Hero regarded the boy in front of her. A year ago he wouldn’t have made that declaration of responsibility, at the picnic he could barely look her in the eye.

“There’s nothing you want to say to me? Nothing at all.”

“Is this what this is about? You want me to yell and tell you that I’m still angry about it all? You want me to tell you I still dream about that birthday party from hell? Or that my brother looks at me like I’m porcelain and stone at the same time? That my mothers tense up whenever I mention a boy over dinner. You want me to tell you all of that, do you John? So you can walk back to your therapist and say you succeeded in your mission and Hero Duke is still stuck in that blue dress while you get to move on from it all. Is that why you’re here?”

Hero hadn’t realised she had quite literally yelled all of that at John. Her face was hot and she had teared up a little. She ignored the bubble of guilt in her chest when she saw John had too.

“I’m so sorry for what I did to you Hero.” John’s voice was quiet; his hand clenched around his half drunk hot chocolate. “And I understand all of that. And I did come here so you could yell. I thought there might be things you wanted to get of your chest.” John wiped away the tear that had reached the bottom of his nose. Hero licked away the ones that had reached her dry lips.

“I didn’t even know I had that all in me.”

“You should try therapy. You just get to yell at someone for $100 an hour if you want.”

Hero laughed.  
“The Bitter Bean doesn’t pay that well.”

“Well, you can always yell at me. I can set time aside for Hero-yelling.” John gave her a smile and Hero remembered how nice it had been to see that smile at the picnic.

“I just don’t understand why it still hurts so badly some days.” Hero was surprised how strong her voice was; and at whom she had just said that to. When had John become someone she could say that to?

“There’s still glass in your palms from that night.” John said sadly. Hero knew it was true for both of them. If a little pretentious. If a little too close to home.

“What do we do about it?”

John’s pause was filled with the dishwasher beeping its completion and the sound of the rain easing off. He looked at her with those dark eyes, still sad, now remorseful.

“We pull it out. Or we wait for our bodies to heal around it.”

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by a text post on tumblr.


End file.
